


Doom Demands the Truth

by Unosarta



Category: Avengers (Comics), Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616
Genre: Avengers Vol. 8 (2018), Confessions, Hopeful Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Suicidal Thoughts, Truth Serum
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-30
Updated: 2020-04-30
Packaged: 2021-03-01 20:14:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23932870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Unosarta/pseuds/Unosarta
Summary: Tony is maybe the worst possible person to get hit by a truth serum, especially when Steve is there to take care of him. Things always seem to end up this way, huh?
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 14
Kudos: 161





	Doom Demands the Truth

**Author's Note:**

> Set at some nebulous point during Avengers Vol. 8 before War of the Realms. I don’t care for Aaronvengers so I’m choosing to ignore everything but the characters and the timing.
> 
> Stevetony truth serum fics always seem to focus on Steve getting truth serumed and admitting his feelings for Tony. I decided to flip the script and see what happened.
> 
> Apologies to Doom fans, I have no idea what Victor is up to at this point in canon and I’m too lazy to find out. Even if he is no longer evil, this still kind of seems like the thing he’d do.

Tony’s mortification was clear on his face. Steve was sure shock was written across his own. He looked behind him to Robbie and Jen, who mirrored his expression.

“I hate myself,” Tony said miserably, covering his face with his hands, sitting down to slump on the battlefield strewn with doombots. It figured Doom would want to embarrass Tony in the most traumatizing way possible.

“Hey, Tony…” Steve began, his voice as gentle as he could make it.

“I hate when you talk to me like that, because I don’t deserve it,” Tony said instantly, face still in his hands, whole body clenched tight in on itself like a fist ready to strike.

Steve gave Jen and Robbie a sharp look, and Jen - thankfully understanding him - grabbed Robbie by the arm and dragged him away.

“That’s not true Tony, but it’s okay if you don’t believe me. I’m going to take care of you now though, okay? You’ve got a cut on your arm and I want to make sure it isn’t serious.” They should really get the Wakandan medics for this, but Steve knew that would be even worse for Tony right now, no matter what he said.

“I like it when you touch me,” Tony said, and his eyes went wide and his face paled. “I hate that I like it, because I shouldn’t, because I don’t deserve that, and I hate that I’m explaining this to you even if I can’t stop it because I’m just putting all of my issues on you again even though you’ve been struggling more than I have, with the Hydra thing. And I hate that I even brought that up because now you’re going to look sad, because you think that’s all people see when they look at you, but all I can see is the best man I’ve ever known. I hate myself,” he finished lamely.

Steve grit his teeth and kneeled down next to Tony, the rough asphalt under his knee a helpful pain to ground him. He grabbed the small medical kit from Tony’s armor, the one he’s used to patch Tony up what feels like a hundred times.

“I hate that I have that,” Tony said, staring at the medical kit through his fingers. “I hate that you’re so good with it. I hate being weak, like I’m holding you back. I wish I was half as good as you are. I wish I had seen the other you coming, I should have, how long have I known you?” His breath was ragged.

“It wasn’t like the skrulls, Tony,” Steve said gently. “He was me in all ways but one. There was no way for you to know. And I saw it, what he did. I know how persuasive he was.”

“He didn’t have to be persuasive. I would have done anything you’d asked of me, anything at all, if it made you happy. The only thing I want is to make you happy and I can only ever fuck that up. I’m so sorry,” Tony said, his voice breaking and cracking into sobs. Steve wasn’t sure if he was sorry for not helping enough or sorry for saying all of this. Maybe both.

“It’s not your fault,” Steve said, disassembling the armor pieces around Tony’s bicep, trying to get a better look at the cut. “You can’t control my happiness, that’s something on me, not you.”

“I wish I could. I know it’s fucked up to want that, because you’re your own man, I hate,” Tony gasped deeply, like he was drowning, “I _hate_ feeling like I don’t have a say in my life. But I might hate seeing you look sad even more than that.”

Steve did his best to smile, though he knew it probably fell a little flat. “That means the world to me, Tony. You know I want you to be happy too, right?”

“I want to kiss you. Right now, but also all the time. I hate that I can’t stop myself from saying this, I hate that I kind of don’t want to, I hate that I’m losing control in front of you and I hate being weak.”

“You’re not weak,” Steve said gently, trying to ignore that Tony said he wanted to kiss him as he inspected the wound in Tony’s arm.

“I’m so weak, Steve. All the other you had to say was a few words of encouragement and I was wrapped around his finger. I fucked up the second most important friendship to me, not that you can really rank this shit anyway, because he told me nice things. How does that make me anything but weak?”

Steve didn’t know what to say, so he took out a disinfectant wipe from the kit and cleaned the area of the wound.

“I thought, maybe if I was good for him, he would love  
me. I’m pathetic. I’m so fucking pathetic and now you’ll hate me and force me off the team and look at me like I’m less than nothing and I’ll agree. You’ll be right, I will be less than nothing, I am less than nothing. I shouldn’t have thought that just because you asked that I would be worthy to be on a team with you again.” Tears fell through Tony’s hands and gently dripped onto the asphalt below.

Steve put gauze to Tony’s arm and began to bandage it in place.

“This is somehow worse than that time that Wanda magicked me drunk and made me almost kill the Latverian ambassador. At least then I could try to convince myself that it wasn’t my fault, even if I wasn’t very good at it. God, I’m reminiscing about mind control to stop myself from saying anything else and making you even more mad at me. I hate when you get mad at me, except I also like it a little bit because at least then you pay attention to me instead of shuffling me off to a different Avengers team because you can’t look at me anymore. I wish I could get rid of myself so easily, I would have done it ages ago,” he said. Steve could tell he was trying to make a joke, but it just sounded pained in his voice.

“I didn’t… that’s not why we were on separate teams, Tony.”

“You’re right, it’s because when we work together I just end up hurting you. I can’t stop doing it, even when I want to, even when I know I shouldn’t. It’s like I’m covered in battery acid, and I want to touch you,” his voice cracked again. “I want to touch you so badly. I want to be around you and feel like maybe I can be half the man you used to think I was, but it’s so selfish of me. I should leave and never come back but I can’t stop being near you even if it’s the worst thing I do.”

“I would stay near you even if you were covered in battery acid,” Steve murmured, probably too soft for Tony to hear.

“I thought the worst part of my life would be that year when I was director of SHIELD. During the skrull invasion, you were dead for all of it so I can’t blame you for not - anyway. I thought that trying to live on when you were dead was the worst thing I would ever experience. I probably would have erased my memories even if Osborn weren’t going after the database, you know? But I was wrong. That wasn’t even half as bad as you leading the Secret Avengers or whatever stupid name you called them, or when you were with the unity squad. When you were dead, I could be convinced it was my fault but that maybe you cared for me, even a little bit. Even if it wasn’t in the way I wanted.”

Steve knew better than to interrupt to ask what way Tony wanted him to care.

“But when you were alive and didn’t want to see me? It felt like I was drowning. Somehow I told myself it would be okay if you hated me as long as you were alive, but it wasn’t okay. Knowing that you hated me so much that you couldn’t be in the same room as me, couldn’t fight with me - maybe even were glad to get rid of me? It was the lowest I think I’ve ever been. I should have been happy that you were alive but all I could think was, _if he hates me, then what does it matter?_ ”

Steve couldn’t bring his gaze from the bandage on Tony’s arm, couldn’t move his neck to look up, couldn’t move a single muscle in his body.

Tony’s voice was barely a whisper. “I thought so many times about ending it. In my worst fantasies, the ones I tried not to let myself imagine, you would come to the funeral. You would cry. You would finally… you would finally…” he breathed for a long, slow moment. “You would finally feel something like what I felt for you. I only survived because Carol was there and she was too stubborn to let me die. I would have done it, I wanted to. I didn’t - not by my own hand, I didn’t want you to think less of me. But in battle, protecting someone. I thought, _Stark, this is the best you’re gonna get. Might as well go out with a bang._ ”

Steve swallowed heavily.

“And now I fucked up everything with Carol, the one person in this whole world, probably, who wouldn’t be happy to see me go - maybe besides Rhodey - because other-you smiled at me. Now I don’t have anything left but this team.” His voice was impossibly soft, probably inaudible to anyone who didn’t have super hearing. “If you kick me, I’ll probably do it. I don’t think I’ll be able to stop myself, I’m not sure that I would want to, and no one else cares. But I would leave if you asked me. Even if it meant I would die I would do it.”

Steve’s eyes were swimming, pulling the bandage in and out of focus.

“I would do anything for you.”

Steve’s fists were clenched on his thighs, shaking slightly with the effort it took to keep himself from punching something. The ground. The busted plates of Tony’s armor. Mostly himself.

“Tell me. Tell me to go and I’ll do it,” Tony murmured, voice perilously quiet.

“I…” Steve began, but he didn’t know how to pull his thoughts from where they jumbled in his mind. So afraid to fuck this up.

Steve stood, suddenly, and walked over to the stinger of the doombot that punctured Tony’s armor. He didn’t know what he was doing, or maybe he did, when he brought it back and kneeled in front of Tony. He took a finger and pricked it on the stinger, feeling the same falling of walls and doors in his mind that Tony must have.

“I love you.”

Tony’s face twisted with something Steve couldn’t identify. Grief? Disgust? He wouldn’t blame Tony if that was what he felt.

“When I moved myself off of teams with you, it was because I was afraid of what I would do if I saw you. I didn’t deserve to be on a team with you. I wasn’t good enough. You should have had people who would treat you better.”

Tony stared at Steve, eyes flicking over his face again and again.

“I was afraid that my feelings would get in the way, or hurt you, or lead to more fights where I said all of the wrong things and made you feel less than you were. Are. I… I didn’t - I _don’t_ \- deserve forgiveness for what I said, so I decided to atone by staying away from you.

“I thought maybe if I wasn’t around you, it would be easier for the both of us. You would forget about me, and I would… stop feeling the way I do about you. It sounds like both of those things were misjudgments on my part. I’m sorry that I made you feel like that - if I had known, I would have held you close even if it meant I got hurt.

“I… the reason why - well, one of the reasons why that other-me is so frustrating is that I could see him use you, manipulate you, and all I could think was, _I should have told him how amazing he is. I’ve spent all these years basking in his light and I let him feel like he’s something less than… than what he is._ I was so furious, not at you or at him - well, not on this front - but at myself, for letting it get that far. For not having the courage to say what I feel.

“I’m a coward sometimes, especially about you. I don’t want you to get hurt, but more than that I don’t want to jeopardize everything we had, even if I should have, to keep you safe. I’m sorry that I failed you, Tony, you deserve a better man than me.”

“You’re an idiot,” Tony said with a small laugh. “I’m an idiot. We’re both idiots. I’m afraid that after everything I’ve said today because of this stupid truth shit, that this is too much. That I’ll have pushed you away. I feel giddy because this - you feeling… the way you feel about me - is probably the one fantasy I never thought could come true. And now you probably don’t want to look at me, and why would you? Dating me is like dating a car battery that could explode at any point. Why subject yourself to that. Even if I want you too very badly.”

“I’ll be honest,” Steve said, which got a snort of laughter from Tony. “Hearing you say that you want to kill yourself when you’re not with me is very frightening. Not because - it’s not because it makes me not want to be with you, or it does a little bit -“ and Steve raised a finger to pause Tony from thinking whatever fool thoughts were in his head, “because I’m afraid that I could fuck this up and make you feel like that again. I don’t - I think we both need some help. In the whole, how to have a healthy relationship department. Before we do anything. But I want to. I want to do anything with you.”

“I…” Tony began. “I want to do anything with you too. So much. So much I don’t know how to say it. Or show it.”

Steve tentatively put his hand on Tony’s gauntlet, and laughed when Tony began struggling to quickly remove the thing. He threaded his fingers through Tony’s and looked up at him. “I think we need to take this slow. I think we need counseling before either of us is ready to try dating. But I… I really want to. I’ve wanted to since I first met you.” He reached up to push a stray strand of black hair from Tony’s forehead. “Sorry, that’s been bothering me this whole time but I didn’t want to interrupt you. I love listening to your voice,” Steve said, filters off, before frowning to himself. “I can see why this was so distressing for you.”

Tony laughed and laughed, let the tension in his body roll out of him from his belly to his mouth, his free hand clasped over his chest. Steve couldn’t help laughing with him.

“Whatever happens. _Whatever._ I promise I want to try,” Tony said, smiling softly at Steve. “I love seeing you on your knees in front of me.”

Steve felt the heat flood his face, opened his mouth to respond and all that came out was, “I want to suck you off so badly right now.” He snapped his jaw shut, eyes as wide as Tony’s were.

“Okay, we’re gonna take this slow,” Tony said, “even if I can’t stop thinking about what kind of blow jobs you would give. I bet you’d be eager for it, huh? You’d probably use too much teeth because you were so excited to -“

“Tony,” Steve said, voice full of fond exasperation. “I’ve given blow jobs before, I know what I’m doing.”

Tony’s mouth settled on a wide O. “Oh. That’s. I need us to stop talking about this right now or I am going to tear off the groin plate with my hands and find out just how experienced you are.”

“Yeah. We’re going to take it slow, right? We’re going to figure it out together,” Steve said reassuringly. “And then I’m going to suck your brain out through your dick like I’ve been thinking about for the last ten years.” His face burned again and he felt so grateful that Jen and Robbie weren’t here to hear this.

Tony sputtered and gasped. “Right. We’re leaving. I’m going to get FRIDAY to schedule something, for both of us, with the best therapists I can afford. Or maybe T’Challa has therapists on call? That seems like something Wakanda would have fixed by now, but who knows.”

Steve laughed, relieved to be talking about something other than Tony’s dick and his mouth.

“I love your laugh so much,” Tony said, voice full of… something. Wonder that he could say this? Joy? “You look so beautiful and unguarded. Sometimes, back when I wasn’t afraid of pissing you off, I would play pranks on the other Avengers during team meetings in the hope that I could make you laugh. I recorded it once, somehow, and I sometimes play it when I feel like I can’t do anything, because it helps me hope that one day I’ll get to make you laugh like that again.”

“Well, you just did, so I’d say mission success. I’d laugh until my jaw fell off if it made you happy.”

Tony blushed deeper than Steve had ever seen him. He pushed himself up to his feet and held out a hand for Steve.

Steve pulled gratefully on the hand Tony gave him, thinking about the feel of Tony’s skin on his. How long was it since they last touched like this, easy and carefree?

Steve let himself believe that Doom’s truth poison made him pull Tony into a hug that made the other man squeak. He didn’t have to pretend as he whispered into Tony’s ear, “I’ve missed you. I’ve missed you so much.”

Tony sighed, leaning down into the touch, pressing his cheek to Steve’s temple. “I missed you too, winghead. I missed you too.”

If Jen and Robbie noticed their hands clasped together when they walked back to the New York portal to Avengers Mountain, they didn’t say anything. Steve looked up at Tony and smiled. Tony smiled back at Steve, and he felt like the sun had washed over him as they stepped through.


End file.
